BoHo Theatre Partners with Northwestern University's Playwriting Program for Next Step Project Play Reading

BoHo Theatre is partnering with Northwestern University's Playwriting Program as part of its Next Step Program. This program pairs advanced undergraduate playwrights with professional Chicagoland theaters, who commission them to write a full-length play based a concept or idea provided by the theater. The theater then helps guide the crafting of the play, culminating in a public reading of the finished script. This opportunity represents a perfect fit for BoHo Theatre, which prides itself on being a supportive incubator for up- and-coming theatre artists.

Through this program, BoHo has been working with playwright Madison Fiedler on a script inspired by the idea "the pursuit of truth in a world increasingly hostile to truth." Out of this process, BoHo is excited to present the new play SPAY, a provoking new drama about the effect of America's opioid epidemic in one small West Virginia town. The play reading will be held on Monday, May 20th, at the Greenhouse Theater Center in Lincoln Park and is open to the public.

Admission is free and open to the public.

Over the past decade, Northwestern University's undergraduate playwriting program has grown from a single year- long course and one new play festival to one of the best undergraduate playwriting programs in the country. As a result, it became necessary to ask what the "next step" might be for students who have reached an advanced level in their studies. The answer to that question has become the Next Step Program, in which undergraduate writers are commissioned by a Chicago-based theatre to write an original pay based on an idea from the theatre, receive guidance from theatre professionals, and receive a public reading presented by a mix of professional and student actors. Now in its seventh year, the Next Step Program aims to create a working relationship between local theaters and emerging NU writers.

A synopsis for the play is as follows: Noah has been a heroin addict as long as her son has been alive. And her sister, Harper, has had custody of that son as long as Noah's been an addict. When an organization shows up offering to sterilize addicts for pay, the sisters fight to determine who deserves to be a mother in a country hooked on pills. Madison Fiedler's drama SPAY is an unflinching look at addiction, Appalachia, and the families our system has failed.

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